Info

Daniel

Name: Daniel RöjselBorn: 95-08-17Lives: Falun and Andersorp (Anderstorp hosted F1 races from -73 to -78).Education:3 year as a racing technician at Anderstorp Raceway.Club:SMK Dala Falun.Family:Father Christer, mother Marie, brother Jimmy, girlfriend Matilda.Strenght as a driver:Ambitious, dedicated, fucused and unafraid! Got experience from many different cars and that makes me a driver that adapt fast info new situations.Want to improve:You can always improve in certain areas but me and my co-driver work alot with pacenotes.Training:Gym and running.Favorite qoute:Nothing is impossible!

Qualifications:2011:4th Swedish Iceracing Championship, 10th Junior Touring Car Championship in Sweden as the best rookie.2012: 1st Radical Propsort Cup. Fighted against topdrivers in the swedish Trofeo Abarth final in Gothenburg innercity. Did a test for a team in the Swedish Elite Racing Legue.2013:6 podiums in rallying on snow. 1st in the Swedish Sportscar Championship (SPVM) with victory in all races! Nordic Formula Ford Champion.
2014: 5th Swedish Sprint Championship (both summer and winter). Victory in East Sweden Rally (Swedish Junior Rally Championship). 3rd overall out of 100 competitors in Gnarpstrofén. 6th in A-driver class 2wd and 12th overall out of 200 competitors in Rikspokalen.
2015: 1st in 2wd and 3rd overall out of 100 competitors in Finnskogsvalsen. 3rd in Swedish Sprint Championship in Örebro (Winter). Podiums in Swedish Junior Rally Championship. 4th in Swedish Sprint Championship in Sundsvall (Summer). 1st and 4th overall ouf of 100 competitors (0.4 sek/km after overall winner and fastest WRC) in Slottssprinten in Katrineholm.
2wd and Junior Champion in the South of North Sweden Championship.
2016:
Signed with Ford of Sweden to drive the Swedish Junior Championship and Rally Sweden in a Fiesta R2t EcoBoost.
Finnished 3rd in the championship.
Victory in RC4 at Rally Sweden.
1st overall in Tractive Winter Sprint.
st in 2WD in LBC-ruschen in Lima.
2WD and junior champion in the regional championship for the second year in a row.
Got invited for a test at M-sport in a Fiesta R5.

Ever since a young age I´ve been interested in motorsport. It was kind of naturally because dad Christer Steen competed in rally on a hight level in Sweden, Great Britain, and Germany. At the age of six I got my own rallycar, or it wasn´t a proper car, but it was a radiocontrolled rallycar in size 1:10 wich looked exactly like the Ford Focus that they competed with in the World Rally Championship back in those days. I became more and more interested and started to buy more cars. Actually it was more mechanic job than driving because it was always something that broke, but I learned a lot.

I also got a quadbike at a young age. I created my own tracks at the backyard and drove as much as I could. I never got tired of it and drove for hours after hours. After some years it was time to leave the quadbike wich was by that time broken in nearly all areas.

When I was nine I got an offer from a Sponsor to compete with radiocontrolled cars. That type of motorsport is quite big in sweden so I took that offer and started to race. If I haven´t had that sponsor I would have to pay 1000 dollar for everything and that was not in my mind as a young kid. My first race was in the beginning of 2008. I finished 8th among guys more than ten years older. The year after I drove the entire season in the middle-swedish series. I finnished second and was first among the rookies. The year after I won the series. Totally I drove about 40 races, I even participated in the Nordic and the Swedish Championship. Looking back to these years I can say it gave me a lot. Fast reactions, nowlidge about carsetup, using the right raceline and so on...

Now it was time to upgrade and store the radiocontrolled car in the bookshell and start with fully scale cars. When I turned fourtheen I started driving a Peugeot 205 that a got from my grandfather on the feilds that belonged to our farm. Like with the quadbike I created tracks to improve my driving skills. A couple of months later I took my racinglicens on Mantorp Park wich hosted Formula 2 back in the days. It was in a drivingschool and I also learned a lot about getting in touch with sponsors and keeping my body physically prepared.

2011
This year a drive in the Junior Touring Car Championship (JTCC) was the big goal. Because I only had a rookie licens I needed to drive three races before I could participate in the series. Driving three races in the middle of the winter when snow covered the ground wasn´t going be easy. The option was to compete in the Swedish Iceracing championship in the far north of sweden. According to the regulations drivers with rookie licens could participate so this was the chance for getting a real licens before the season in the JTCC started.

Iceracing is like asphaltracing but on ice. After a practice run the final starts. Between 6 to 8 laps are driven in the aproximately 2 kilometer long courses on top of a frosen lake. Like rallycross the competitors start side by side. Cars that were aloud to compete were rally, rallycross and racingcars, all driven on rallystuds. I drove the same 1.6 liter Opel Corsa that my father won the Swedish Rally Championship with in 1996. The competition was tuff against cars with over 200 bhp compared to my 170 bhp engine. Even dough I manage to finish 4 th in the championship. I´m really happy with that, it was an experience to drive these races and it will centanly not be the last time. But the main thing was that I got my real racinglicens!

The season in the JTCC was a big step for me wich I learned a lot from. Even dough the difference between the cars were big and the fastest driver not always won I got big experience. We had a family team and fighted hard to get the Ford Fiesta to go as fast as possible even if it was the car with the least amount of power. I have to say I´m happy with my 10 th place in the series as the best rookie!

2012
That was the year when my career really got a push. I got in touch with the CEO at Mattsson Fasteners, a company that makes bolts, nuts and washers as the biggest in scandinavia. I was hoping for a drive in thier racingteam. Just before the season started I got a call from Ingvar Mattsson who wanted me to drive his Radical in the Swedish Radical Series. That was a unique chance for me to make something good out of that year. I ended up the season 1st in the championship with a total of 5 wins in 6 races. Radical was the fastest racingclass in Sweden and I earned a lot of respect only by the fact I could handle such a car. The Radical is made from a tubular frame with a plastic body. With the light weight of only 600 kilos and a Suzuki Hayabusa engine that produced over 200 bhp the car could accelerate from 0-60 mph in under 3 seconds and run at a top speed of 160 mph!

I also drove a Fiat Abarth for Mattsson Fasteners in the Trofeo Abarth series final at the innercity of Gothenburg. After only a test of 3 laps at Anderstorp Raceway earlier the same year I qualified 4th. The race unfortunaly ended in a crash involving several cars including me while I was going for the lead in the race.

In the end of the season I got the chance to test for a team in the Swedish Racing Elite Legue wich was the higgest class in Swedish racing (now called STCC). The tubular frame saloon car with over 400 bhp and a paddelshift gearbox were handling good in the hands of me and my driving impressed the team. Unfortunaly I did´nt have money enough to drive for them in 2013.

2013
Did my rallydebut in the end of Januari driving a VW Golf Mk2 standard rallycar that me and my dad built during 2012. Drivers in Sweden between 16 and 18 compete in a certain class called "education" and because they can´t have their drivinglicense before they turn 18, an experinced Co-driver with a certain permission needs to compete with them. Because I turned 18 in Agust I did 8 races with the Golf in the beginning of 2015 with my dad as a co-driver. We did 6 winter rallies and 2 gravel rallies. In the end I could summit the "education" season with 6 podiums and 2 victories.

When the summer got closer I also decided to do some racing. The Radical Series had been splittet in Sweden and the best choise was to take the Radical from last year and compete in the Swedish Sportscar Championship with competiton from other Radicals and Sportscars. My goal was to have fun while I was driving at that time one of the fastest class in Sweden. It ended with victory in all races I participated in and a Championship win. I also did my first race in a formula car when Andersorp Raceway hosted Formula Ford NEZ Championship. That debut ended with a Champinship win in the Zetec class and a lot of experience from formula cars.

After my 18th birthday in the middle of August and a passed drivinglicense test I could do my rally debut for real. It resulted in a carchange and a new co-driver that were allowed to read pacenotes for me. Me and Nicklas Edvardsson whon the C-class for 2wd drivers in our first rally togheter with the same Opel Corsa that I continued to drive for the next two years. I drove two more rallies that atumn and I got enough points to start 2014 as a B-driver.

2014
This year became a little bit of a breakthrough but was also going to be a lot about bad lock with the car technically.

Due to bad wheather in sweden with a lot of worm winds and little snow many rallies were cancelled. The car needed to be tested and I needed driving training on snow before the up comming Östersund Winter Rally wich was the start of the Swedish Championship. One opportuninty was to compete in the Swedish Sprint Championship in the far north of Sweden in a town called Umeå. We went to the rally with hopes of a god test before the championship season started. It went much better than all of us expected. 5th in the championship among a lot of experinced drivers. A couple of weeks later we were even more surprised when we finnished 3rd in Gnarpstrofén among 100 competitors from all over north of Sweden. It was also the first time we wrote our own pacenotes!

The feeling was on top when it was time for Östersund Winter Rally. The plan through the championship was to learn, get experience and avoid stupid misstakes, just finish.

Our expentation were high, this was the rally that we had talked about for 6 months. When the recce was done and we waited for the first two stages to start on friday night our hopes were high. The rally started at 8 o´clock in the evening and it was going to be tough. Over 30 km specialstage in darkness. When we got to the finish it felt ok but not superb, I tought to myself that it was a warm up for tomorrow. But neither Nicklas or I counted on being in the lead with 40 seconds in the Junior Championship and 3rd overall among the seniors in 2wd! Many were really impressed with our performance. On Saturday morning we kept our lead and did another top time in the total standnings. We had all in our hands when on the second to last stage a bolt that keeps the fuelrail in place broke. Fuel was leaking and we could get to the fuelzoone but not further...

The year continued with top-results in rallies like, Kong Kristian Race and Kopparsvängen before it was for the first gravel rally in the Swedish Championship. The rally were hosted in Köping in the middle of June and here we also were fighting for the gold when a fuel-leak stopped our progress after a fire. Luckily a couple of spectators helped us and we walked away fine and with a not to harmed car.

A small fightback came when we fineshed 5th again in the Sprint Championship, but now on tarmac and in the summer among even harder competiton.

East Sweden Rally in Linköping was the second to the last rally in the Swedish Rally Championship and here we finally could get to the finish without technically problems. We showed our real speed and performance and won the rally in our class. This luck was not going to last for long when we retired in a safe second place at the final in Rally Uppsala two weeks later atfer a broken driveshaft.

Among a lot of other topresults in bigger local rallies during the year, we got a good end to the season finishing 6:th among the A-drivers with a competiton of 40 drivers in the class with Patrik Flodin a second ahead of us in Örebro´s Rikspokalen.

2015
Continued with the Junior Championship in the same Opel Corsa as last year with co-driver Nicklas Edvardsson. Started the year in the best possible way by winning 2wd and finishing 3rd overall among 100 competitors at the classic Finnskogsvalsen at some Rally Sweden ground in the north of Värmland. Did the Winter Sprint Championship this year again and took a bronze medal with Emil Bergkvist at the top of the podium.
The first championship round, Vinterpokalen, in Sandviken became my first rally with my own pacenotes. After a smart driving at the start of the championship we manage to get 3rd. Later that winter we took part in Östersund Winter Rally as the second round of the championship. I had good speed right away from the start and I had developed my pacenotes even more since Vinterpokalen. We were in the lead in 2wd overall when at SS4, a rear damper broke following a lost wheel hub in the last corner of the last stage. Luckily we manage to bring the hub with the wheel, brakes and everything to the service. The team did an amazing with and got the car repaired in the right time before we headed to the last stage. We last some time due to no brakes at the rear but finished 3rd after all in the junior class.

When the gravel seasong started with South Swedish Rally in May we wanted that top podium finish. It unfortunately become one of our thougest with a car that didn´t work as it should have been and a co-driver with back pain. But with a second place we were happy after all.
At the Summer Sprint Championship in Sundsvall we had a medal in sight but after we drove the last heat without power steering we had to settle 4th, only 0,1 second to 3rd.

We decided to give it all in the last three Championship rallies of the year, and we did, but the car didn´t.
At Rally Askersund in August we showed our pace with winning all stages untill a seal in the engine broke and we lost all oil after SS5. At that point we had a 40 second lead among the Juniors and were 3rd in 2wd overall.

The disappointment in Askersund made us want even more at East Rally Sweden in Linköping two weeks later. Already on Friday´s second stage we manage to beat all seniors with much more experience and took the lead among the Juniors with almost 9 seconds. At SS4 on Saturday we lead by 48 seconds in the class when at the road section to SS5 the gearbox broke and the rally was over again.

At the finale in Rally Uppsala the championship gold were gone but we aimed for the other medals. But somehow we got that unluck straight away and the gearbox looked at 4th gear at SS1. We were heading for another stagewin and rally lead at that point. We got going again but on SS2, a short city stage in the dark, we had to run without lights after the alternator belt broke at SS1. Once again the team did an amazing job and got the gearbox repaired in the middle of the night. The team got a prize from Öhlins for the effort later that weekend at the prize ceremoni.
With 48 second to the lead on Saturday morning the chase was on. We won stage after stage and got closer and closer. Before SS9, the second to last stage, we had 4,2 seconds up. A puncture on the stage in combination with SS5 being cancelled lost to 11,7 second behind. We couldn´t catch that time at the last 3,4 km stage but took 4,7 second and a stage win. But it was not enought for a medal.

Sadly we had to much technical unluck this year but the speed was defenetly there and we showed the capacity by winning all stages exept for one in the last three rallies.